day one for CE.

NEW AND WANNABE DRIVERS (INTERACTIVE)
1

After telling my agency of my little experience, of course this meant nothing, my first shift on an C+E was with the post office driving a double decker trailer.

what a night of being laughed at and watching head shaking. I took three attempts to reverse on a dock blocking all the traffic in the yard.

As an agency worker you are dropped in at the deep end, not vehicle familiarisation, no real time spent showing u not much at all really. A Google map printed out for directions.

I have never felt so humiliated for such a low salary. First day and last day. I’ll return to PCV instead. At least the load unloads itself.

2

yoyoyo:
After telling my agency of my little experience, of course this meant nothing, my first shift on an C+E was with the post office driving a double decker trailer.

what a night of being laughed at and watching head shaking. I took three attempts to reverse on a dock blocking all the traffic in the yard.

As an agency worker you are dropped in at the deep end, not vehicle familiarisation, no real time spent showing u not much at all really. A Google map printed out for directions.

I have never felt so humiliated for such a low salary. First day and last day. I’ll return to PCV instead. At least the load unloads itself.

I might be reading into this wrong but I am very tempted to say - “GROW UP and get a backbone”

3

I susoect that depends on the agency and the client.

One agency sent me to the client and i had proper induction and training. Another agency sent me to another client and the client was not even aware it was my first time on their premises.

But if it is not your cup of tea you might feel more comfortable with pcvs

4

ROG:

yoyoyo:
After telling my agency of my little experience, of course this meant nothing, my first shift on an C+E was with the post office driving a double decker trailer.

what a night of being laughed at and watching head shaking. I took three attempts to reverse on a dock blocking all the traffic in the yard.

As an agency worker you are dropped in at the deep end, not vehicle familiarisation, no real time spent showing u not much at all really. A Google map printed out for directions.

I have never felt so humiliated for such a low salary. First day and last day. I’ll return to PCV instead. At least the load unloads itself.

I might be reading into this wrong but I am very tempted to say - “GROW UP and get a backbone”

then read this right, go ■■■■ yourself

5

Perhaps I was right to say what I did as it comes down to attitude/way of thinking IMO

Did you ask for help or join in with the banter :question:

6

ROG:
Perhaps I was right to say what I did as it comes down to attitude/way of thinking IMO

Did you ask for help or join in with the banter :question:

+1

7

I’d say 3 goes to get on a bay is bloody good for your first time.

Would you have done it in less if you’d had a full induction and vehicle familiarisation?

A Google map is a bonus too. All I get is a thing called “an address”

Did you then have to unload the decker after all those attempts? I’d be very surprised if you did

8

Wow. Good job ot wasn’t a bad day :unamused:

9

3 goes seem pretty reasonable.

They may have been laughing at you now but at some point they were in the same boat as you. Take it on the chin and day ■■■■ em. The most important thing is you got it on the bay, nobody died and nothing was damaged.

With agency work it’s all down to the prep, take the sat nav and maps, get the address, get the keys and off you go. If it takes you half an hour to get familiar with the wagon before you leave the yard, so be it, you’re getting paid for that half hour after all.

10

Didn’t like it then, back to stagecoach it is then

11

Why spend all that£ too quit after 1 decker rog is correct I say

12

You should have done it blindfolded like a real driver :slight_smile:

13

yoyoyo:
then read this right, go [zb] yourself

ROG is right, you need to grow up.

Once that’s done, you can make a start on growing that backbone he mentioned, or better still, a set of balls you soft ■■■■■

14

I’ve just started out on the cat c’s so just about every truck is new to me.

I just ask is there anything I should know about it, can they give me a quick once over on the gearbox (particularly if it’s an auto I’ve not seen before) and chuck in a bit of self deprecation (hi I’m Danny your limper for the week. Is there somewhere I can plug my headset in to charge).

If I’m struggling with something I just ask. 9/10 a regular driver has been only to happy to help out.

True, if you’re agency you can just get chucked a set of keys but from that point on you can make life as easy or hard on yourself depending on what you do next.

15

All I can say as a fairly inexperienced artic driver and ex pcv driver, is the OP is obviously not cut out for this industry if he can’t handle simple trunk work and a bit of ribbing without throwing a tantrum.

Toodle pip

16

Don’t waste your time talking to this bloke, he’s probably being spat at by passengers by now. Something tells me he didn’t get the responses he wanted.

17

PaulNowak:
Don’t waste your time talking to this bloke, he’s probably being spat at by passengers by now. Something tells me he didn’t get the responses he wanted.

Haha Paul, I hope he is. If he’s going to come on here looking for sympathy due to having a ahem ‘hard shift’ he could at least keep his attitude in check and show some respect to one of the most helpful and knowledgeable blokes about in regards to Rog.

18

Unfortunately you have crap days, take it in your stride and move on… I’d much rather take a few shunts getting on a bay then drive a peasant wagon tho!!

19

3■■ 3■■?
I would have been doing cartwheels and asking where the showgirls were if I managed that on my first day :exclamation:

Thing is, on this forum, anyone will get help if they ask a genuine question or raise a valid concern.
However, most guys can also smell a rat about 4 miles off.

And I have to agree.
Either you are trolling with your OP…
Or, you are not being genuine for some other reason.
I just cannot believe that you have worked on PCV’s, and therefore with the lovely general public, and then claim to be so susceptible to a bit of banter, ok somewhat childish maybe… but still.
Similarly, and for the same reason, surely you can’t be that naive to think that an agency was going to roll the red carpet out and send you for a 2 week induction course for what is basically a 1 job at a time kind of business?

Jon

20

yoyoyo:
After telling my agency of my little experience, of course this meant nothing, my first shift on an C+E was with the post office driving a double decker trailer.

what a night of being laughed at and watching head shaking. I took three attempts to reverse on a dock blocking all the traffic in the yard.

As an agency worker you are dropped in at the deep end, not vehicle familiarisation, no real time spent showing u not much at all really. A Google map printed out for directions.

I have never felt so humiliated for such a low salary. First day and last day. I’ll return to PCV instead. At least the load unloads itself.

I have recently joined an agency after a while not driving and signed up to go Royal Mail (I guess this is the ‘post office’ you refer to?)

On my first day I also did not know where to go/what to do but I was very friendly/polite and admitted my ‘shortcomings’ to all by saying that I was a ‘newbie’ and would they patiently tell me/show me what to do, and any ‘tips’ about the place I was heading to for my pick up (ie any tight turns/difficult bays to reverse into etc?)

one of them found one of the ‘supervisors’ to show me round and tell me what to do, someone else alerted me which way to go to my pick up point and how to approach it etc

I also got a double decker trailer which I had to ‘unload’ when I got there, full of trolleys of heavy mail, I am skinny and have no strength in me but I kept my head up and did it, I took it as ‘good exercise’ for the day :smiley:

I then had to do 2 more runs loading unloading these trolleys, I have to say I much prefer my ‘old days tramping’ with my fridge trailer doing nothing but drive hahahaha but hey as I cannot go back to tramping I have to stick with the odd agency shift (beggars can’t be choosers)

If you have the choice to go and do something you like better yes…‘do it’, I would :slight_smile:

I also spent 20 minutes (yes 20) trying to reverse onto one of those bays, I felt totally embarrassed but kept thinking ‘if I don’t reverse this thing onto the bay no one else will, I got to do it’ :smiley: :smiley: :smiley: and at the end I did it, happy to say I have not (yet) had a recurrance of such bad reversing…

Yes agency drivers are dropped in it but if we go in with the right attitude it helps and never be afraid to ask others, most people will be friendly and help.